Ulenspiegel said to Nele:
“Why do you not come beside me?”
Then, helping her to get up into the cart, he made her sit beside him, took the apron from about her head and the cloak from her shoulders: then giving her a hundred kisses, he said:
“Whither wert thou going, my beloved?”
She answered no word, but she seemed all entranced in ecstasy. And Ulenspiegel, transported even as she, said to her:
“So thou art here, indeed! The sweetbriar roses in the hedges have not the lovely redness of your fresh skin. You are no queen, but let me make you a crown of kisses. Darling arms, all soft, all rosy, that Love himself made all on purpose for kissing! Ah, beloved maid, will not my rugged man’s hands wither that shoulder? The light butterfly settles on the crimson carnation, but can I rest on your dazzling whiteness without withering it, clumsy lout that I am? God is in his heaven, the king upon his throne, and the sun is aloft, triumphing; but am I God, the king, or sunlight, to be so near you? Oh, hair softer than flossy silk! Nele, I strike, I rend, I tear to pieces! But do not be afraid, my love. Thy darling little foot! How comes it to be so white! Has it been bathed in milk?”
She would fain have risen.
“What fearest thou?” said Ulenspiegel. “’Tis not the sun that shineth on us and paints thee all in gold. Lower not thine eyes. See in mine what a lovely fire he lighteth there. Listen, beloved; hear, my darling; it is the silent hour of noon; the peasant is in his home feeding on his soup, shall not we feed upon love? Why have not I a thousand years to pluck one by one on thy knees like a string of pearls from the Indies!”
And Master Sun blazed through the white canvas of the cart, and a lark sang above the clover, and Nele drooped her head upon Ulenspiegel’s shoulder.